


The Red Badge of Cougar

by executrix



Category: Firefly
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-04
Updated: 2011-07-04
Packaged: 2017-10-21 01:02:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/219181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/executrix/pseuds/executrix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's Boy Week on that show where somebody has to go out with someone younger than them, and someone older, and they have to pick. Malcolm in the Middle, once again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Red Badge of Cougar

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt by karmageddon, the GODDESS of prompts.

**WEDNESDAY (Serenity)**  
It was unusual for Kaylee to be the last one at the dinner table, but this time, she timed her entrance for maximum drama. "Y'all got took!" she said, her face split with a dimple-flashing grin.

"Shen me?" Simon asked.

"The cap'n, and you and Jayne! On Generation Sex!"

"Wait a minute…" Wash said. "You mean, that show where somebody has to go out with someone younger than them, and someone older, and they have to pick?"

Kaylee nodded to Simon, who had pulled her chair away from the table, and nodded again to Wash. "Yeah! It's Boy Week!"

"Well, it's impossible," Simon said. "I mean, even if I had the slightest interest in doing anything like that…"

"Aw, c'mon," Kaylee said, mashing miso into the last one out of that crate of rubatagas they traded for on Whitefall. "…Like it ain't the Dick-Size Olympics around here. 'Cept it's all the time, not just every four years."

Jayne guffawed. "Well, we know who's the bobsled team from the tropical paradise, don't we?"

"You might be surprised," Simon said. "That is, if you were ever going to find out."

Jayne shrugged. "If I cared, I could get an eyeful what with them million showers a week you take. What your real problem is, though, that Mal don't care."

Mal, intrigued by this new turn in his life, thoughtfully and silently chewed purple protein satay and watched the two most frequent squabbling partners among his crew. It was sort of interesting to see them squabbling over him. He could see why Inara might get a kick out of that sort of thing.

"…Showing good taste if he wants information about more than one organ to make a relationship. But as I say, even if I could be persuaded to do anything so grotesque, I couldn't jeopardize River…"

Wash, consumed with jealousy because he hadn't thought of it himself, pointed out that there were two signatures on the application, Kaylee's and River's.

"I'll be safe! You can drop me off on Bernadette," River said. "At the retreat house, with Book. Sanctuary is the rule there. And hairnets."

Zoe filled up mugs from the battered graniteware coffeepot. Mal took a long pull on his, and said, "Kaylee, why in Helen of Troy's hatpins would I want to do this?"

"They say there's no such thing as bad publicity, and we might could get some jobs from folk who see you," Kaylee said. "And you three'll get a nice vacation out of it."

"Don't need a vacation. Every day's a holiday here, Kaylee," Mal said. "Naaah, I think you'd best backwave 'em and say that you're sorry, you promised but you can't deliver."

Kaylee and River exchanged glances—should I tell him or will you? River tipped her chin slightly, deferring to Kaylee. "Prize's twenty-five thousand plat," Kaylee said.

Mal suppressed his spit-take, put down the mug with a clack, and said, "That's it. We're in."

"Y'mean **I'm** in," Jayne said. "Don't take no Reader to handicap this race."

"Captain, I don't think this is…"

"Ain't a democracy, Doc."

"Ooooh!" Jayne said. "I bet that just pleats his panties when you get all masterful like that, Mal."

Simon looked up from the distorted reflection of his face in his teaspoon. He looked like he was contemplating sharpening it (possibly merely by glancing at it, or rubbing it over his teeth) and using it to saw through Jayne's trousers and subsequently his femoral artery. "You know, Jayne, sometimes I console myself by thinking about the multitude of entirely undetectable methods I could use to kill you. But then I say, no, because what could I inflict on you that would be any worse than your having to continue to be you?"

Wash leaned forward, his chin in his hand. You just didn't get quality entertainment like that every day of the week.

"If we had twenty-five thousand plat, we could get credit at every fueling stop in this Sector," Kaylee said dreamily. "I could jack out that whole line of fluorine pump controls that's been givin' me such a headache, strip 'em back to the trey feed and replace 'em all. And we could get a coupla barrels of jerky, a smoked ham or two, some sacks of flour and a bread machine. We could eat bread **every day**. Fresh bread, not hardtack. And we could get a three-pack of compressor coils. Well, retreads, anyway. Keep 'em on hand 'case she blows again."

"Kaylee, what I learned on the way to becomin' the mean old man I am…"

"Better not be," Kaylee said, "'Cause then you wouldn't be eligible. Gotta be somewhere in the middle."

"…is that the generals are always fightin' the last war. Don't do no good to get ready for the shit that already happened, 'cause it's always some **different** shit that happens the next time."

 **THURSDAY (Generation Sex Studio)**  
"All right, gentlemen, flip for it," said the slender young woman with the two clipboards that she had to juggle to produce a coin. "And remember, smile pretty for the camera, because you could be filmed at any time!"

"Tails," Jayne said with a spacious leer. "Head's more your speed, I reckon, Doc."

Simon brushed his hair back with the hand he had dropped his face into. He turned to Elva Cortijo, the production assistant. "I'd apologize for his crudeness, but, well, you checkbook journalists thrive on that sort of thing, don't you?"

Elva concluded that the five credits she had bet on Simon were a lost cause, and decided to put ten credits on Jayne.

The coin came up heads. "All right, then, Tam, you get the Friday night Dream Date. Cobb, you get Saturday night. Here's a thousand credits for each of you for the arrangements. Both of you, and Reynolds, will have to be at the studio Sunday at three p.m. to tape the results show. Or rather, hair and makeup call at three, in the studio at four for live broadcast. We'll show the footage we edit from your pre-interviews and whatever we tape from your dates. The studio audience has voting buttons at their seats, and we take Cortex votes, phone votes, votes from pasukoms, whatever. Simon looked down at the pile of notes in his hand, and whispered an inquiry to Elva. "Yeah, okay, I guess," the host said. "Nobody ever asked for that before, but I guess in your situation…"

 **FRIDAY: Dream Date With Simon!**  
Simon opened the bottle of champagne quietly, thinking it vulgar to do it noisily, and risk spilling on the carpet (and wasting good champagne). The waiter lugged a heavy rack, with three layers, laden with shellfish on a bed of seaweed.

Mal looked down at the array of silverware on the thick damask napkin and on the other side of the plate, on the thick damask tablecloth. He picked up a butter spreader and jabbed it down at the tablecloth. "Dunno what to do with all this stuff," he said.

"Oh, for heaven's sake, Mal, just start at the edge and work your way in," Simon said, nodding as the waiter composed a seascape on Mal's plate.

"Them things **alive?** Mal asked.

"Oh, I should hope so, in a restaurant of this quality," Simon said, squeezing lemon juice over a tempestlimpet. "Yes, it is, you can see how it responds to the lemon juice…" He tipped back his head and swallowed the tempestlimpet. When he saw Mal's stricken glance down at his plate, he reached across the table, touched Mal's hand gently, and summoned the waiter. "I'm sorry, I ordered poorly. Please take my dining companion's plate back to the kitchen, prepare the oysters as Oysters Rockefeller, and bring him some smoked salmon."

Usually Mal liked a good rare steak, but somehow that night it didn't look as appetizing as usual. His appetite did perk up a little by the time the Baked Atlantis was delivered.

"So, I guess now that we're together, I guess you should feed me a line about why I should go for you 'stead of Jayne."

"Because I can offer you so much more! He's…he's dragging you down. Keeping you in on the same path, or spiraling down even further. Now that things have, well, slowed down a little, we have plenty of time to…improve ourselves! To take advantage of the opportunities that you and most of the crew were denied. To study! River {{when she's lucid}} isn't just a great student, she's a splendid teacher. We can learn, uh, physics! And mathematics! And great literature! And languages! It'll be just like Love's Labour's Lost!"

"You said it, boyo, I didn't," said the cameraman, who popped up from under the linen tablecloth on the dessert cart and started filming. "Hey, what's in that wrapped-up package next to the butter plate?"

"I almost forgot," Simon said. "Mal, this is a signed first edition of Wilbur Shanks' "Wireweeds." He carefully untied the patterned cloth and held up the book for the camera. "Shanks, of course, is near-universally acknowledged as the greatest novelist in the history of Shadow, and the founder of the Prairie School. This is his masterpiece. It hasn't been out of print in two hundred and fifty years, but mostly on the Cortex. When I saw the auction listing for the hardcopy…well, I don't believe in omens, but if I did…"

"Aww, Simon, you really shouldn't have!" Mal said. "But since you did, it's…real omen-ous." The cameraman zoomed back from the book on the table to Mal's face. "So, what next?" Mal asked, a tad dispiritedly.

Simon grinned. "I forgot about the fantastic way that money just opens doors! You'd think there wouldn't be any seats available for the Opera House on the opening night of a reconstruction of a Chu'ung opera—she was **the** leading opera composer of the twenty-third century. For years, everyone just assumed that most of the score of "Tractors and Peonies" was lost, that she must have been dissatisfied with it and destroyed it and never got around to revising it, but then a historian found a full copy buried in the chips of an obsolete cortex box belonging to the secretary for a minor regional opera company. It's the most exciting news for the entire opera community since…well, since I don't know when. You've never seen anything like it, I guarantee. But, by discreet bribery, I managed to get us a pair of orchestra seats-- tenth row on the aisle!"

Trailed by the cameraman, they walked, hand in hand in the perfumed indigo evening, the three blocks to the opera house. Simon bought a program for each of them, and arranged for cocktails to be served in a private salon at the interval. The crowds parted as the usher led them to their seats. "Uhuh," Mal said. "Hey, how come it's got Chinese writing on the back of the seat?"

"Mandarin supertitles," Simon said. "You see, for realism—Chu'ung was a leader in the Verismo school—it's actually sung in an obscure Fujianese dialect, and it's not one of those operas where you can just assume everyone knows the libretto forward and backward…"

"It ain't one o'them?" Mal said. "I'm devastated."

After Mal had been squirming in his seat for about twenty minutes, there was a disturbance. A refined disturbance, given the setting, but a couple of guys in good suits slithered up to Simon, which involved tripping over Mal because Simon let him have the aisle seat for being taller. "I'll have to ask you to come with us," one of them stage-whispered.

Mal's stomach dropped with adrenaline as his heart rose at the prospect of not having to sit through any more of the godawful caterwauling and plinking. Simon simply turned to the eleventh row, where a tall, slender woman with a scarf around her neck had been playing Tetris on her personalcomm, after texting everyone she could think of, and reflexively kicking the back of Simon's seat.

The woman unfolded a document from her beaded clutch bag. "Am-scray, fellas," she said. "This is a Temporary Restraining Order signed by Judge Cruzeido." Simon patted Mal's shoulder reassuringly. "You stay here. I'll go and get this sorted out. Here…" he said, and handed Mal the second keycard for the hotel suite. "If I'm not back by the end of the performance, it's the Hilton Palais. Any rickmule driver will know where it is."

Mal was already halfway out of his seat. "I should go with you, help out…" Simon just smiled at him, touched his index finger to his own lips (a sight that Mal found rather fetching) and stood up.

Simon, the woman in the elegant black suit, and the two guys with the bulges under the arm and the curly pigtail headsets, went out into the lobby.

Mal stuck it out until intermission. He was going to make a stealthy escape, but he remembered that there was a room with some drinks reserved on the Parterre, whatever that was. He had the drinks, and when Simon still hadn't turned up, he started to worry about him. He got directions to the hotel—Simon was right, everyone did know where it was—and decided to stretch his legs.

Halfway back, the clouds opened up, and the drenched Mal felt distinctly at a disadvantage in the ebony-walled lobby. To his considerable relief, he got up to the room—the suite—without being accosted by the house detective. The key card (it was a real card, not a lightbulb) worked perfectly.

Simon was sitting on a white brocade couch, reading "Wireweeds." He wore a pair of disposable gloves from his med-kit to avoid messing up the pages.

Mal looked around, stunned. The room seemed to be about the size of Serenity's cargo bay, but featured a lot more mirrors, lacquer, silk, and fur. And the fur was not draped over living, breathing livestock, either. "Huh!" he said. "Some place!"

"There's coffee in the carafe, or there's a bar if you'd like a brandy," Simon said. "Oh! You're so wet!" Simon gestured at the thick drapes shielding the eighteenth-story window. "I didn't know it was raining."

"It is that," Mal said, opening doors until he found one that led to a palatial bathroom filled with velvety towels, one of which he applied to his hair and torso. "What happened back there?"

"Oh. Well, Those two men were from the AIA. They were planning to bind me by law. Or worse. I rather thought they might, so I had the producer of the show get their pet barracuda to nibble on their tame judge. Ms. Morgan got a temporary order that says that, in return for my agreeing to leave on Sunday and never come back, I'm exempt from arrest on this charming planet."

"They didn't wanna bust me?"

"Oh, don't worry, Mal, around here you aren't important enough…I mean…you hardly have any felony warrants in this System, and none of them is a law-enforcement priority…" Simon closed the book reverently, and went over to the ebony-inlaid silver coffee service. He raised a translucent porcelain cup in Mal's direction, but Mal shook his head. Simon poured himself a cup of coffee to create a moment of silence.

"You never came back to the theater."

"No, by the time we had a colloquy in the lobby, and then Ms. Morgan got the judge to come back into town and open up his chambers to tell the AIA men to go peddle their fish somewhere else…I was embarrassed that I had already caused a disturbance, and I didn't want to distract the audience any more by tearing again at that powerful web of theatrical illusion. And, anyway, it gave me a chance to get a look at that book. I never realized that your home planet produced any literature that was so…so…potently imaginative." Simon gave one hungry look in the direction of the book, and another in the direction of Mal. He took a deep breath. "Well, since you're soaked through, you can have the first bath."

"First bath?"

"Oh, I suppose it's silly," Simon said. "We don't have to worry about the hot water running out!"

"Yeah, but I mean, aren't you supposed to be, y'know, toweling me off with some portion of your **body**? We ain't in town for the tiddlywinks championship."

"And I haven't won the competition yet, have I?"

When Mal got out of the bathtub, he found that Simon's clothes were neatly put away in the big closet with the mirrored doors and the ivory-inlaid armoire (except for his shoes, which had been put outside for polishing). Simon was asleep, on the couch, wearing the other terrycloth robe and wrapped in one of the off-white silk duvets. Mal ate the chocolate-macadamia nut clusters on top of the topmost three pillows, and then decided he was pretty tired himself.

 **SATURDAY Dream Date With Jayne!**  
Normally, Jayne would have made Mal carry the gigantic blue-and-silver plush sabertooth, considering that it was Jayne who won it and all, but in light of his objective and the possible appearance of a camera crew, Jayne hauled it around himself. With the tiger's chin on his shoulder, the beast kept knocking at Jayne's knees, and its tail occasionally had to be rescued from mud puddles.

They were a little unsteady because Bub's Barbecue Pit didn't have a liquor license, which inclined its patrons to drink up faster in case the Fed (irrespective of weekly envelopes) decided to raid. So Mal and Jayne had a couple-six boilermakers apiece to wash down the piles of armadillo brisket, hot sausage, goat shoulder, and fried dill pickles heaped on the brown paper on the rough wood tables. There was a knife chained to each table, but of course Jayne carried a wealth of personal cutlery. And, because it was a special occasion, Jayne splashed out on half a loaf of bread. "Eat up," he said. "There's an amusement park just downtown."

They went on the Zero-Grav Wheel, the Tunnel of Reavers (Jayne jumped onto Mal's lap at the beginning of the ride and stayed there), and the Wild Beagle. Then they had a couple of long-necks and some cotton candy, then Jayne won a raft of prizes culminating in the stuffed tiger.

"Hey, Simon got me a present," Mal said. "How come you didn't get me a present?"

"Whaddaya call this?"

"An offense to the public eyeball. Anyway, you didn't buy it, you won it."

"I budgeted out what we'd be spendin' tonight, considerin' that I'd have to do more shootin' than natural, 'cause they bang them rifles all up to hell. Gorram if I don't hate a low, cheatin' lyin' crook if it ain't me. Then I spent the rest of the day down by the docks, gift shoppin'."

"So, what'd you get me?"

"Waltraud," Jayne said. "She's a rocket launcher. I don't got one o' them.."

"Jayne, y'mean you took the money you was supposed to be usin' to get me all sweet, and bought **yourself** a present?"

"That ain't a fair characterization, Mal, I think she's more the kinda thing the whole family can enjoy."

"Huh. Hey, which hotel did you book us into? Be a hoot if it was the same one as Simon did."

"Hotel? Waste o' money, Mal. I'm gonna show you a good time, which involves stayin' out all night hellin' around anyway 'cause we can sleep when we're dead."

As they promenaded through the park, Jayne slung his arm around Mal's shoulder.

"Hey!" Mal said. "Maybe that's not such a smart thing to do…" as they passed a small knot of men in rubber jackets with elaborate patterns in their shaved hair.

"Naaah, it's all good," Jayne said. "It's on the list." He told Mal's raised eyebrow, "No, really. There's a list." He rummaged around in his pants and came up with a crumpled bit of paper. The items "Get Drunked Up" "Scarf Some Q" "Win One O Them Big Stuffed Animals At the Shootin Booth" were already scored through. "Brawl" was not.

One of the men catcalled. "He your boyfriend, **Sweetheart**?"

"Yeah," Jayne said. "But he's real jealous. Betcha he's gonna kick your ass for hittin' on me like that."

"Kick their ass? Hey, I'm not lookin' for trouble, 'specially with the cameras on me an' all."

The tip of the flying wedge flew toward them. Jayne impatiently stiff-armed the leader, who fell precisely to become a stumbling block. "They'll love it, Mal," Jayne said. "Mostly this show is just sex [punch], sex [kick], sex [elbow-jab]. So what they need, change it up some, is a little violence." Just a little, though. Jayne didn't want Mal to get hurt bad enough to give The Candy Striper a chance to sew him up and electioneer.

One of their opponents tenderly raised up the fallen comrade, and threw him at Mal. Mal socked him in the eye. The guy's brother-in-law swung at Mal, but Jayne lifted him away with an iron-bar arm around the throat, and Mal hacked a kick at the departing shins.

There were several more free and vigorous exchanges of opinions, and Mal's blood was singing in his ears, when he and Jayne both noticed that several of their dance partners had located some lengths of two-by-four in a trash can. The addition of implements moved it out of the class of purely recreational affray, so with one accord, Mal and Jayne ran past their antagonists and behind a booth that had a "Dinner Break—Back at Nine" sign on the door. One good snap kick to the lock and they were inside, in the dark, tripping over things. From the sweet-salty smell, Mal thought it might be the salt-water taffy booth.

Jayne took a pencil flashlight out of a capacious trouser pocket, and swept it around but he could tell right away that the booth's owner had taken the cash drawer along with him or her to supper. He found the list again, burrowed for a stub of pencil, and dashed off a thick line.

"Whatcha doin'?" Mal asked.

"Crossin' off 'Bump Uglies,'" Jayne said, giving the flashlight one last blast so he could locate Mal.

"Jayne!" Mal said. "This is not exactly the most propitious spot for…" he started to utter the euphemistic "romance" and down-geared to "sexin' up."

"We got two hard cocks and no pressin' appointments," Jayne said, pushing Mal down until his ass hit the counter. "Sounds pretty prerequisatious to me."

"Yeah, well, let me remind you, the camera crew could turn up any moment," Mal said. "Hell, maybe them guys we just beat up was them."

"Make for some interestin' damn footage if it was. But the guys we're gonna beat off now is us, and if they can film any-damn-thing in here considerin' that it would be like checkin' a black cat for piles down a coal mine, good luck. Anyway, not much to see, with my body coverin' yours up…" Jayne shoved until Mal slid back on the counter, his boots dangling a few inches above the floor. Jayne pushed his hands along the inseams of Mal's pants, parting Mal's knees a little, then straddled his legs. Mal could feel the strength of the long thighs capturing his own. Jayne's hands roved in circles over Mal's chest, and then pushed behind him, underneath his coat, one hard hand radiating heat per shoulderblade. Mal gasped and his head fell back and that cued Jayne's teeth sinking into his neck, the scrape of beard and the pull of suction and he felt he would have fallen without the hands holding him up. Then it was just one hand digging into his shoulder, as the other hand flicked aside fly buttons and fastened onto Mal's cock, as implacable as a magnet. Jayne squeezed slowly at first then sped until his fist accelerated to a punch's benevolent twin.

With nicely judged timing, Jayne seated himself on the counter next to Mal just as Mal melted into a sated crumble. And for a little while, he rubbed the back of Mal's head in his lap (the sound just noticeable in the thick dark) but then he gave a little upward shimmy to propagandize Mal's next move.

The sound of Jayne's belt buckle hitting the counter resounded to cover the smaller sound of buttons snapping open. Mal would have delayed a punishingly long minute, just licking the head of Jayne's cock, a fraction of an inch per touchdown, and another minute sliding his tongue back and forth on the ridge, back and forth like the pendulum of a long-case clock (at least one hand on the clockweights). But he had an excellent sense of time, and he figured it was getting on for nine o'clock. So he paid attention to the groans, and after a few nips and kisses just indulging himself, he gave a few sucks all the way down Jayne's cock, but slow and loose-lipped, before he settled down to tight strokes. The hair on Jayne's balls felt soft as cotton candy, and when he came (this was a job where Mal didn't mind having his name shouted) the salty quinine chased the cloying taste of cotton candy.

In the friendly dark, a finite one this time, Mal rubbed his face along Jayne's thighs and waited for the strength to come back to their legs. "Time to get a move on," he said. They left the park and found a Blue Sun Spot, because it was open all night and they always gave you lots of napkins, although Jayne bitched because they only had boring milkshake flavors like litchi and mangosteen. (Mal said that you couldn't expect strawberries in a mass-market place like that.)

Mal cleaned up the best he could with the napkins and then they sat on a park bench, sipping milkshakes, which, the price of rocket launchers being what it is, Mal had to pay for.

 **SUNDAY: Studio**  
Simon got to the studio at 2:57. He had been concerned that reading the last few pages of "Wireweeds" would make him late, but he was just in time. His competitor and their prey were already at the studio. Mal was crashed out on the greenroom couch, looking so rough that Simon had to reassure himself, by penlight, that Mal's pupils were still equal and reactive. Mal was not happy to be awakened, but a hangover shot from Simon's medical bag made up for it a little.

Jayne was in the mailroom, teaching the young idea to shoot craps.

Precisely at four, they stood on the stage, being cheered by the audience. The MC who, with her up-do and heels taken into account, was very nearly Jayne's height, lowered her voice confidentially. "Malcolm Reynolds…are you a fraud?"

Mal's heart began to pound, and automatically he reached toward the holster on his thigh, which (studio rules) he wasn't wearing. But he knew that he had a two-shot derringer in his boot, and Jayne probably found some way to fold up Waltraud inside his cigar case, so he calmed down. "In what way?" he asked mildly, knowing that making extravagant allegations was one way to fish for confessions.

A film clip began to run on a huge screen at the back of studio. Mal, telling Nandi that he leaned toward women. Mal and Nandi…leaning. Tastefully, but leaning. Mal was pretty sure that he had a surviving member of The Rance Burgess Organization to thank for that little calling-card. And, thinking it over, it wasn't surprising that the Heart of Gold had been festooned with as much surveillance gear as tinfoil.

"Well, yeah, if all the girls I ever was with was laid end to end by all the fellas I ever been with, there'd be plenty of girls left over so I hope for their sake they better not mind a little of that girl-on-girl action. Or have fresh batteries. But that don't mean I can't appreciate the sturdy swell of a bicep or bein' woke up by the scrape of stubble on my chest, not to mention other stuff I best not mention what with your Family rating an' all."

The studio band played something that sounded more like the prelude to a drumhead court-martial than a riff.

"Malcolm Reynolds, do you solemnly swear or affirm that you will abide by the results of the popular vote?" Mal held up his right hand solemnly, crossing the fingers of his left behind his back. Mal was pretty sure that Simon was enough of a gentleman that he wouldn't force his attentions on an unwilling person just because of some dumb Cortecast, although he might feel that the 25,000 plat imposed some kind of ethical obligation.

After a commercial for Blue Sun mule tires and headache remedies, they showed a clip filmed Saturday morning in the hotel room. The cameraman caught Simon in a sneezing-kitten yawn as he sat up on the sofa.

"So, you struck out, huh?" the MC asked. "Got shot down in flames?"

"No," Simon said, casting a longing glance at the snowbank in the bed consisting of the quilt-covered sleeping captain. "If and when I win this competition, then I will give Malcolm Reynolds my faith and my fidelity and I will expect the same from him. There will be no ampersand."

And the entire audience wondered who Amber was.

"I've done my best to show him the kind of life I wish I could offer him on an ongoing basis. All right, things will change when we get back to…to our regular routine, but if I win, then we'll be together. And I'll try to make that make all the difference. Or enough of it."

Across the room, Mal heard the voices and pattering feet and sat up (a vision that the studio audience fully approved). "Wassup?" he said. "We got folks?" and, seeing that there was no emergency, he slid back under the covers and went back to sleep.

There were commercials for a supermarket chain and Microsoft MBoxes for Cortex connections and department store sales.

Jayne's clip was taken as he entered the studio early Sunday morning. The fifty credits Mal gave him as a grubstake had been multiplied many times over, and he was in an expansive mood (unlike the pre-interview, where he glared in stony silence for five minutes after being asked what kind of tree he'd be if he were one). "Wanna know what my secret it? See, the biggest reason why folks get a divorce—by paper or by Smith and Wesson, don't matter none—is hookin' up with someone and then tryin' to turn 'em into somebody else. I know what Mal's like. I know his idea of fun. And he had a whole boatload of fun with me and absolutely no fun at all with Nurse Nancy. 'Cause, sure, there ain't a whole lot of Browncoat vets left standin', but I bet lots of 'em does regular stuff or even pantywaist stuff like bein' schoolteachers or somethin'. There's other stuff they can do besides crime, if they're inclined. So the kinda person that does Crime is someone who wants the excitement. Also, the apple don't fall far from the acorn. Mal ain't Core-bred, and he don't aim to make you think he was. So the key is, if you wanna lay down with him, ya gotta let him know that the way he is is plenty to turn your crank. And have a firm hand if he gets too big for his britches."

"Well, I'm sure Standards and Practices will have a field day parsing **that** statement," the MC said, and then there were commercials for a touring puppet show and marinated pressed protein and headache pills and ship insurance and the voting was open. To cover the time for tabulation, one of SolAzul Muzeek's new young stars plugged his latest single. Then a starlet from Bleusoleil Pictures brought in the envelope on a silver salver. There were more drumrolls as the MC pretended to fumble at the envelope. Behind her, the results were displayed. Simon got 814,209 votes.

Jayne got 3,285,402 votes and, since he had cast only 17,000 of them himself, he felt vindicated by the results.

The MC shrieked and, when bouncing up and down, the top of her bouffant soared above Jayne's head. "Jayne Cobb, you have a ticket on the Hot Tamale Train!"

Jayne ripped open Mal's shirt (the audience ooh'ed and aah'ed) and pointed to the suck marks on his neck. "The red badge of cougar!"

"Well, that just goes to show that age and treachery will always beat youth and skill, doesn't it?" Simon said bitterly. Then he decided he'd better try to be a good sport, so he patted Mal on the shoulder and held out his hand for Jayne's handshake.

Jayne grabbed the hand and stuffed it down the front of Mal's pants so Simon could find out what he was missing.

 **SUNDAY: Serenity**  
River sweet-talked one of the monks into taking her back to Serenity in time for the Results Show. Book stayed behind at the chapterhouse of St. Anselm's Cathedral. Inara was boycotting Boy Week entirely, and Zoe informed Wash of his lack of interest in that sort of carryings-on, leaving River and Kaylee alone in front of the Cortex screen.

"Just as I predicted," River said. "Jayne and Mal have a lot more in common than Mal and Simon anyway."

Kaylee sighed. Readers were worse than great-aunts for telling you "I told you so!" all the time. She craned her neck over to where River bogarted the bowl. "There any popcorn left?"

"Just old maids. Apropos, the upshot of the contest is that Simon is back in play. Just where we want him. Do you want a little side-bet to make it interesting? On your mark, get set…"

"Riv-er! He's your brother!"

"Your point being?" River said. She spat into her palm {{Guess someone in the family spits}} Kaylee thought. River held out her hand toward Kaylee, and cheerfully said, "May the best kitten win!"


End file.
